PRAIRIE CITY – When 500-foot-tall flames roared through the heavy timber surrounding High Lake, nobody dared to venture too close.

Ben Croft watched the spectacle from a safe distance. It was late on the afternoon of Sunday, July 21, when High Lake Fire, a relatively new addition to the Malheur Complex, mounted one of several devastating flare-ups before finally boiling over into the Roberts Creek Fire to the east.

On July 22, two days before the fires merged and forced a temporary evacuation of County Road 62, Croft reflected on the unpredictability of forest fires. He was surveying the High Lake bowl from a ridge on the southern rim of the Strawberry Mountain Wilderness at a time that the fire had settled down. However, the temporary reprieve on this particular afternoon did not fool Croft. He knew the quick and erratic nature of forest fires.

“When these things get rolling, they get rolling, and when they start crowning and running, you can’t hike out fast enough,” he said.

Croft should know. A photographer with the Missoula (Mont.) Technology and Development Center, Croft produces footage for firefighting safety videos. He has documented tragedies such as the Thirtymile Fire near Twisp, Wash., where four firefighters died.

High Lake Fire, unlike many of the grim disasters Croft has covered, proved to be a success in terms of fire-crew management. It’s not always easy to convince Hot Shots and other firefighters to withdraw – included in the teams assigned to High Lake Fire were the Prineville Hot Shots, the Redmond Smoke Jumpers and a number of Grayback and other hand crews.

“They don’t like to call it quits,” said Croft, who himself has firefighting experience and knows the aggressiveness of professional firefighters.

At High Lake, crews tried to catch the lightning-caused fire early, but safety zones were compromised, Croft said. Managers ordered the firefighters out. A short time later, their caution was justified. The fire exploded.

Tactical and operational decisions dictate the movement of fire crews. Croft emphasized that Mother Nature, not man, is in charge when high-intensity fires take off.